


Like Wine Through Water

by Mithen



Category: DCU - Comicverse
Genre: F/M, Farewells, Pre-Capes, Telepathy, Young Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-04-02
Updated: 2010-04-02
Packaged: 2017-10-08 15:11:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/76939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mithen/pseuds/Mithen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>College-age Clark has a date with his girlfriend, the mermaid Lori Lemaris.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Like Wine Through Water

_"I have dreamed in my life, dreams that have stayed with me ever after, and changed my ideas; they have gone through and through me, like wine through water, and altered the color of my mind." --Emily Bronte_

Clark Kent almost knocked over one of his classmates in his hurry to get out of chemistry class on Friday. "Man, what's gotten into Kent?" complained the other student, rubbing his arm. "Usually we have to pry him away from the beakers."

Another student laughed. "Maybe he's got a hot date."

General laughter. "Considering it's Kent, it's probably with Rosy Palm and her five daughters!"

Clark hadn't even bothered to keep an ear on the conversation; he was already in the air on his way to the Pacific Ocean. He did a neat tuck and dive into the waves (sheerly showing off for his own entertainment, since no one was looking), and plunged downward. Soon the towers of Atlantis loomed before him, lit by the phosphorescent blue-green light that illuminated the perpetual darkness of the deep water.

A bare-breasted mermaid, her brown hair drifting about her head, darted up through the water to hover before him, reaching out to clasp his hands in hers. Lori Lemaris. The first time he had come to Atlantis he had been shocked by the fact that Lori went topless there--somehow he had expected coy seashells or seaweed wrappings--but she had just laughed gaily. "Clark, you dear boy, this isn't America. Consider this practice in becoming more...open-minded," she had said, winding her tail around him and pressing herself against him to kiss his cheek.

Clark decided he was willing to get that practice.

Now, as she clasped his hand, a flood of images passed through his mind. Atlanteans were telepathic; they could shape clear words mentally, but most communication was done in a wave of images and emotions. He saw Lori's week in an instant: her work on a new breed of medicinal seaweed, an afternoon of sun-dappled enjoyment playing with her pet porpoise, her anticipation at seeing him again, her satisfaction now at touching him. The satisfaction was shaded with something deeper, textured like velvet, but Clark's telepathic skills weren't as advanced as hers and he couldn't process it. She laughed over his latest misadventures in college, sighed at the images he shared of dealing with school bullies, and took pleasure in his happiness that his school football team had won.

At some point in the sharing she had gotten into his arms and they drifted together in the warm water, his cape billowing behind him, her hair a cloud on his chest. It was different than flying, more languid and sensual. "My love," she thought, very quietly. "I must tell you. The Council of Elders has told me this can't continue."

Clark felt the salt water on his lips, on his face. He had known this was coming. The Atlanteans were secretive and xenophobic and they had never approved of Lori's venturing to the surface world. He didn't search for words, just let his grief and anger flow between them, feeling her sorrow as well.

"Love," she thought after a while, "Please don't think me terribly forward, but...I would like to consummate our relationship in the time we have left."

Clark felt himself blushing. "Con--con--" he started speaking out loud without thinking and coughed on salt water, started over again telepathically, sending both his pleasure and excitement along with his confusion, as he stroked his hands down the lovely shining scales at her hips.

Lori doubled over laughing, momentum pushing her away from him somewhat. "Not procreation, silly. Consummation. Among our people, the final intimacy is telepathic, of course."

More confusion. "Isn't what we're doing telepathy?"

"Consummation is more than that, dear. Deeper." Her emerald eyes sparkled and deepened. "It's the most intimate sharing two beings can have."

He felt excitement stir in him and knew his unworded telepathy was freighted with both anticipation and trepidation. His clumsy telepathy was a constant source of joking among the Atlanteans he had met, although Lori had assured him he was better than most humans. Suddenly Clark understood some of the snide comments he had overheard: "He must be rather _clumsy_ if eager in his telepathy, Lori." Concern went through him and she stroked his face gently.

"Let me take the lead, Clark. I'm sure it will be all right." She leaned forward to kiss him and he felt a gentle probing sensation at the edges of his mind, totally different from any he had felt before. A voice beyond words, beyond emotion, in his head: _Open yourself to me._

Clark opened himself to her. All of himself. The bright places, the dark and dim places, the stars at the core of his being. He felt her wonder, the dizzy rush of it, as he was swept in turn into her, the dappled and shifting silences, the luminescence at her heart a blue-green beyond any mortal vision. They mingled like wine in water, until Clark could no longer tell where one began and the other ended.

He tasted acceptance in her thoughts, an embracing of what would be that transcended resignation, that approached ecstasy, and the acceptance washed through him as well. They drank each other to the fullest, and then they let each other go, to love and be whole and to never look back in bitterness.

They had their time.


End file.
